South Texas Snow?

Yes Virginia, it snows in South Texas. The last time it happened was in 2004 and the Coastal Bend had it's first White Christmas since 1918. For it to snow in South Texas, many meteorological factors have to line up perfectly, and in my 30 plus years, it had never snowed in and around my hometown. I'll leave it to the experts to explain what exactly happened that December, so check out the website of the National Weather Forecast Office in Corpus Christi, TX, http://www.srh.noaa.gov/crp/stories/Christmas2004/christmas_2004.html. It is a fantastic site with amazing radar and satellite imagery, and photographs from the area recalling the storm's path through South Texas. Yes, I said storm. This was no mere dusting of snow that anyone in the northern parts of the state may experience anytime during the winter months, but with snowfall measurements ranging up 12 inches, what much of the Coastal Bend experienced that day, was indeed a winter storm.

This has to be my all-time best Christmas. It ranks up there with the time I got my first telescope, as mentioned in a previous entry. The days leading up to Christmas that year were fairly mundane. We were not planning a trip home that Christmas because of time constraints, so we were pretty down about staying in town for the holidays. But those sullen days turned exciting when my wife came home from work earlier that week, to say that she was able to get the 23rd off, which gave us an extra travel day. I, of course, was happy about going home, but I told her this: If we had just the slightest prospect of having a White Christmas here in town, we would stay here. The irony, right!

We left north Texas with snow on the ground and the temperatures hovering in the low 30s and as we trekked south, the temperature did not creep higher as it usually does anytime through the year. I know that before we left for home that there was an outside chance of some sort wintry mix over the holiday, so I kept that in mind as we drove home. Nothing frozen fell from the sky the 23rd, but Christmas Eve would be vastly different.

As the 23rd became the 24th, the weather folks said that we had a good chance of the frozen stuff, namely sleet and maybe a few flurries. They were right as we had a couple shots of sleets in the afternoon, with an occasional snowflake thrown in for good measure. As the afternoon progressed into evening, the sleet stopped and the white stuff turned from hard, icy pellets but to floating flakes of snow. Being a weather nut, I turned the TV onto the Weather Channel and by this time, we noticed that we were under a winter storm warning! What the...!!! Yep, this became the stuff you hear about happening somewhere "way up north," where they're used to this kind of precipitation. Even the Weather Channel's winter weather expert beamed with excitement to see this type of weather occurrence happen so far south! My brother and I ventured out after sundown and watched the flakes grow larger and with much more intensity and velocity. So here we are in South Texas, near Corpus Christi, on Christmas Eve, and we find ourselves right in the middle of a winter storm.

My aunt and uncle from Austin were driving into town, but were caught in the storm about 60 miles, or about a hour drive's away, but they didn't arrive until after 10pm. What is usually a 3 hour drive became about a 7 hour ordeal. My uncle said that he drove with his head almost out of the car's window, going about 20 miles an hour. No wonder they took so long to get home!

We all turned in early and didn't realize how much snow had fallen overnight. My dad, having worked overnight, woke us up and cheered us on to see what Mother Nature had left for us this Christmas morning. What greet us was simply awe inspiring: a winterland landscape with lawns and cars buried under several inches of snow, and all framed with crystal-blue skies (the snowstorm of the night had moved quickly away from the coast by daybreak). Needless to say I clicked away my camera's film, so much so that I had to borrow my mom's last roll of film. My aunt and uncle who drove through the storm just hours earlier, drove by while while I took pictures and asked if we had anymore film because all the stores in town had run out!

Now, whenever I hear Irving Berlin's White Christmas playing anytime during the holiday season, it takes on a whole new meaning after having endured my first White Christmas in my hometown. No longer was a White Christmas something out of a Christmas movie or something that happens in Michigan, year in and year out, but it was certainly something I will never forget. My first White Christmas was magical and holds an almost mystical place in my heart, especially because where it happened. Although two years have quickly passed by, I still cannot believe I was able to witness this event. I was lucky and blessed to be in in my hometown on that Christmas Day in 2004. Strike that... I was lucky and blessed to be in my hometown on that WHITE CHRISTMAS Day in 2004.